


Scholastic Pursuits

by StormsBreadth



Category: A Charm of Magpies Series - K. J. Charles
Genre: (of about the same level as canon), Alternate Universe - College/University, Attempted Suicide, M/M, Not Beta Read, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Rating May Change, and i will not be accepting criticism for it, discussion of suicide, whether characters use their first name or last name is decided on an arbitrary basis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-18
Updated: 2019-11-18
Packaged: 2021-02-08 06:54:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21471862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StormsBreadth/pseuds/StormsBreadth
Summary: Lucien Vaudrey's first few weeks back in Oxford after a year studying in China are going badly. Not only is someone trying to kill him through unknown magic, but the only person who seems able to help him is Stephen Day, a tiny magic user who, for quite justifiable reasons, hates his guts. But things are going to get worse before they get better, as Oxford is gripped in a magical conspiracy that will change both men's lives.(tags, rating, characters etc may all be subject to change)
Relationships: Stephen Day/Lucien Vaudrey
Kudos: 13





	Scholastic Pursuits

**Author's Note:**

> listen sometimes you just gotta write a multichapter modern au for a fandom with all of 18 fics in it ok. 
> 
> this chapter contains reference to use of hard drugs.

> Dear Lucien,
> 
> Thank you for reaching out to the college welfare team – we understand that you’re going through a difficult time at the moment, and we appreciate that you have come forward for support. Please know that you aren’t alone, and that it is very normal to feel depressed following the death of a loved one.
> 
> In this sort of situation, we would generally advise that you seek professional help. I have put through a referral for bereavement counselling at the University Counselling Service. In the meantime, you might find some of these links helpful –

Lucien stopped reading at that point, snapping the laptop shut with an exclamation of ‘Fuck!’

His friend Merrick looked up from across the room, where he sat on Lucien’s spare chair, his own laptop balanced on his knees.

‘Problem?’ he asked. Lucien scowled, and pulled his laptop open again rather than answering, wasting a couple of seconds typing his password in again before showing it to Merrick. The other man’s brow creased as he read the email, mouth moving slightly as his eyes tracked the words. Unlike Lucien, he actually clicked the links, and apparently read the whole thing, but the reaction was much the same:

‘Bullshit,’ Merrick said, and Lucien was immediately grateful for the presence of his best friend,

‘It’s like they just saw that it came from Lucien Vaudrey and got excited to use their “bereavement support” email template, without actually reading anything that I wrote.’ He stopped, scowled, read the email again. ‘In fact, I’m pretty sure that’s literally what happened here. How am I meant to deal with this whole mental health thing if no-one’s listening to a word I’m saying?’

Merrick looking at him for a moment, considering, before looking back down at the email again, scrolling down to the bottom, Lucien assumed to look at the email he’d sent the day before. He was disgustingly familiar with the words written on the page: despite only being about a paragraph, it had taken him about an hour to write the damn thing and he’d reread it a dozen times, making sure to explain  _ clearly _ that it had nothing to do with his father’s death, or his brother’s death, or the stress of the new term, but it didn’t appear to have done him much good. 

‘What if it’s not a mental health thing,’ Merrick said after a moment. 

‘What the blazes do you mean by that? What else would it be? Oxford have one of the world mental health records in the country - I know, I looked the statistics up - and it seems that every other student is crying themselves to sleep at night -’ 

‘Yeah, but you ain’t every other student.’ Most of Merrick’s accent had been rubbed out of him by two years at Oxford, talking to the educated upper middle class, but it came out occasionally. ‘Think, man. You’re not depressed. We  _ know _ depressed people, and sure “depression looks different on everyone” but that ain’t you.’ 

Part of Lucien thought he should argue. Like everyone else in the college, the majority of their first couple of weeks at university had been characterised by bright faced representatives telling them all about self care, and how mental health looks different for everyone. He was very well aware that there wasn’t anything shameful about having mental health problems, and they could happen to anyone, and all those 

But what Merrick said sounded right. He didn’t feel depressed, and while he had drunk several bottles of expensive rice wine when he’d heard that his father was dead, that was a justifiable celebration at having outlived the bastard, rather than a desperate attempt to cope. 

So he lent back and looked at Merrick. ‘What do you think then?’ 

‘Shamans.’

Silence hung heavy in the air for a moment. Merrick had a heavyset to his jaw that showed he was planning to dig his heels in about this one, so rather than dismissing the idea Lucien stopped to think for a few minutes.

They’d both spent the previous year abroad, theoretically studying Chinese literature at Peking University, but actually doing what could euphemistically be termed ‘getting to know the county better’. Lucien had come out of it with an enviable network of business contacts both legal and not, several hundred thousand pounds in business assets and a truly wild set of stories.

All of which he'd have more of if the news of his family's deaths hadn't reached him in July. The summer hadn't been a pleasant one after that: rather than fucking about in Shanghai for two months with Leonora and Merrick, he'd been forced back to England to deal with the mess that comes from the sudden death of a millionaire and his eldest son and heir. Lucien had spent a frustrating two months on the phone to his lawyers, his father's lawyers, his father's business partners, and Leonora, the last mostly to vent his frustration at the others. It had honestly been a relief when he'd received the polite but firm letter telling him that, unless informed otherwise, Christchurch College were expecting him back on the 10th of October.

Two weeks into term and it felt like the right choice. The businesses were mostly ticking over in the hands of some very capable lawyers, and aside from the odd email Lucien was back with his friends and free to split his time between drinking, fucking and occasionally looking vaguely in the direction of his degree work.

The whole thing should have been brilliant for his mental health, but apparently it wasn't, because he kept wanting to kill himself. Hell, kept trying to kill himself, and thank God he hadn't managed it yet. But despite that it felt out of character, episodic. He'd felt it when he first when back to Piper after returning, like a dark haze settled over his vision, but it had cleared once he'd been dragged out into the sunshine. Even now it only came in fits and starts: sudden feelings of suicidally intense depression, but completely fine the rest of the time aside from a growing sense of frustration.

It definitely lent something to Merrick's theory. Back in China, they had run into shamans a few times, where ‘run into’ was again a euphemism for ‘fucked, nearly been killed by, or both’. God, Lucien had some stories to tell there, or would if anyone but the small band of students who had actually been there would believe him. They'd certainly seen some things that defied belief. Objects moving seemingly of their own accord. Men being driven mad by words alone...

'We're not in China now,' Lucien said carefully, and Merrick shrugged.

'Doesn't mean there's not any shamans. Or, I don't know. Witches, or whatever.'

Lucien sighed, not feeling overly optimistic about the whole thing. The term 'witches' made it all sound a lot more Harry Potter than he was happy with, but he tipped his chair back to think about it anyway, drumming his fingers against the arm as he did. He and Merrick had been accompanied on their various escapades by an assortment of friends and fellow students, and Lucien wracked his brains to think of the one who'd seemed to know the most.

'Theo might know something?' he suggested. Merrick frowned.

'Theo Rackham? Isn't he too busy doing coke to know much these days.'

'He's busy doing coke, but if anything that's going to make him know more. Or at least say he knows more. Either way, I don't know where else we'd start.'

'Right.' Merrick put Lucien's laptop down and pulled his own up. 'Well then. Do you want to try getting hold of the bastard, or should I?'


End file.
